Rankings, rankings, rankings.

If you want to work up a sweet profit in 2022, it’s all about rankings.

What kind?

Google rankings.

As web users search for relevant products/services/content, your business should ideally show up first.

Nobody has the time to scroll through dozens of SERPs. People generally click on the first few results, finalize their purchase, and call it a day until the next time they need something.

If your business isn’t ranking #1, you’re lacking in the link building department.

That’s what we’re here for.

What is link building? Why is it so important for SERP rankings? How can you find link building opportunities in 2022?

We’re breaking it all down! Keep reading for a beginner’s guide to successful link building in 2022.

 

What is Link Building?

Let’s keep things short and simple so we can focus on the meat of the matter.

Link building is the process of getting backlinks from other websites.

Backlinks are hyperlinks that take web users to your website.

Let’s say Forbes comes across your content. If they like what they see, you’ll earn a reference.

Forbes may link to your blog, product, service, homepage, social media page, or anything else that caught their eye.

This is what the backlink (hyperlink to your stuff) will look like:

In this example, “Mashable” is hyperlinked. As web users click on this backlink, they’ll be taken to Mashable’s home page.

Why is this a good thing for Mashable?

It’s simple.

Forbes is a multimillion-dollar company. It earns a whopping 117.4 million monthly visits and has an impressive DR (domain rating) of 94.

When you earn a backlink from Forbes or any other high-DA site, you redirect their web users to your stuff.

And these aren’t regular web users. They’re well-informed browsers with high purchase intent.

When thousands or possibly millions of quality browsers flock to your site, your traffic and conversion reports will look extra pretty for the month.

See how this works?

As you build more and more quality links, you’ll rank higher and higher. And that’s exactly what helps businesses get back on top and stay on top.

Here’s a video that offers more insight into backlinks:

What is Link Prospecting?

So link building is the process of earning backlinks. What’s link prospecting?

Backlinks won’t come flying to your site like UFOs (we wish). If you don’t actively seek out backlinks, you’ll twiddle your thumbs all day.

Link prospecting is the art of discovering new high-DA sites that can offer you backlinks. It’s the research side of things, and boy, is it important.

If you don’t identify the right backlink partners, you’ll build weak backlinks that do little to nothing for your rankings.

Let’s talk about DA real quick. This score ranges from 1 to 100. The higher, the better.

High-DA sites are the most reputable, trusted, and credible domains out there. If they offer you a backlink, you’re in luck.

As a rule of thumb, you should always prospect sites with a higher DA.

Use a website authority checker to determine how authoritative a site really is. As you enter their URL, you’ll obtain a complete picture of their credibility.

How to Find Authority Sites in Your Niche

1. Set Your Criteria

Excellent planning is the foundation for seamless execution. If you don’t research backlink partners correctly and comprehensively, you’ll fall flat on your face.

Many businesses make the mistake of jumping into things without setting their criteria. This is the biggest link building faux pas you could make.

Kick things off by identifying your backlink criteria.

Based on your industry, target audience, products/services, and envisioned growth, what kind of sites do you want to target?

Remember, not all backlinks are equal.

High-DA backlinks can boost your rankings and credibility, while certain low-DA sites can get you penalized.

Avoid prospecting sites at random.

Understand your business and target sites that can benefit you.

For instance, if you run an interior design business, you should target companies like Architectural Digest, Elle Décor, Adore Home, Blueprint Magazine, and so on.

If you actively try to build a link building partnership with, say, Tech Advisor, you’ll waste your time, money, energy, and resources.

While this may sound like an easy mistake to avoid, many small businesses and startups self-sabotage by targeting domains that are irrelevant to their industry.

Do your research, set your criteria, and proceed accordingly. This little step will go a long way in helping you shape up a nice link prospecting plan.

Pro tip: Before you kick things off, run a quick background check. Are you targeting a site that’s part of a Private Blog Network (PBN)? This can put your SaaS website in trouble.

If Google finds out that your site is earning too many backlinks from PBN sites, they’ll conduct a manual review or make an auto-decision through their algorithm. Your site will be penalized, i.e., you’ll lose your position within organic search and stop appearing among the top SERPs.

Make sure you target credible sites that use white hat SEO strategies. The last thing you want is to get penalized without even knowing what you did wrong.

2. Find the Top-Ranking Content for Your Keywords

It’s time to get to work.

Now that you know your backlink criteria, start finding link building prospects.

The best way to go about this is to find the top-ranking content for your keywords.

Every business has a set of high-ranking keywords. This list changes every month. If you don’t have yours yet, click here.

Once you identify high-volume search terms for your industry, enter them in the Google search bar. The results will include top content that includes these keywords.

Here’s an example.

If you run an IT management consulting firm in Washington, your keyword list will include “best IT management consultants in Washington”.

Here’s what this looks like when entered in the Google search bar:

And here are the search results:

 

Good Firms has a DA score of 83, Management Consulted falls at 50, and both Upwork and Glassdoor steal the show with a DA of 91.

While Management Consulted shouldn’t be your first choice, Good Firms, Upwork, and Glassdoor are great backlink partners.

Repeat this process for every keyword in your monthly list.

Focus on different types of keywords, especially short-tail, long-tail, geo-targeted, and LSI keywords.

The more specific you get, the more niche the company.

As stated earlier, make sure they boast a nice DA score (ideally 65+) and follow white hat SEO strategies.

Look for their reviews and ratings online.

Does everything look good?

Additionally, run a quick Google search. If the company has recently gotten in trouble for saying/doing something problematic, you’ll find out pretty quickly.

The Google algorithm isn’t just smart, it’s precocious. Negative press never goes unnoticed.

Cigna is a global health service company based in Connecticut.

When you search for the company online, the following “People Also Ask” section pops up:

You don’t even have to get specific. Google will do the job for you! But of course, ask similar questions to get an idea of whether you’re requesting backlinks from the right company.

Explore their social media pages to understand whether the masses like them. If something’s off, hold off on that backlink partnership email.

No matter how successful a company may be, you shouldn’t partner with them if they have been part of a recent controversy. As their audience hurls criticism at them, you’ll also come under fire by virtue of association. Instead of getting good press, you’ll end up with a bucketful of vitriol.

3. Use an Advanced Link Prospecting Tool

While manually searching for backlink partners isn’t a bad approach, it’s also not the fastest.

Today, you can use dozens of cutting-edge link prospecting tools to find the best link building partners in your industry.

At Search Berg, we use advanced tools to fetch credible sites with a lot to offer.

If you want to take the legwork out of link prospecting, turn to the pros for fast, affordable, and comprehensive results.

When combined with manual link prospecting strategies, this neat little trick will help you build successful link building partnerships.

4. Find Guest Bloggers/Influencers in Your Niche

Guest blogging is one of the best link-building strategies out there.

When starting off, most companies fail to build backlinks organically. No matter how great your products/services may be, you’re still new. It’ll take some time for industry giants to notice your presence and understand that you’re here to stay.

Until then, start writing kickass guest blogs for the most popular guest blogging sites in your industry.

You can even target influencers who run personal blogs!

But how do you find them?

Social media is your best friend.

Use the “Who to Follow” tab to find the most popular and relevant local influencers in your niche.

As you explore different profiles, you’ll discover even more people.

Here’s an example.

Austin Evans is a popular tech review influencer based in Los Angeles.

Next to his profile, you’ll find a “You Might Like” section:

As you click on “Show More”, you’ll find even more relevant influencers.

Do a bit more digging and shortlist influencers who run blogs. When done right, this approach is extremely powerful. It will help you identify the most relevant influencers and earn traffic through them.

You can also use LinkedIn suggestions to find guest blogging partners.

And, of course, Google is also a very useful tool here. Use advanced Google search operators to land relevant guest blogging partners. Start off with these:

Need an example?

Let’s say you sell electric toothbrushes.

If you follow this technique, you’ll fetch a plethora of relevant results:

These search results include industry-related companies that accept guest blogs from brands that sell electric toothbrushes.

They’re not direct competitors, so you have nothing to worry about.

This is one of the best ways to find authority sites in your niche.

Create a spreadsheet and start shortlisting platforms later.

As always, check their DA and general reputability on Google and social media platforms.

Everything looks good? Start drafting that backlink partnership email!

You’ll earn a nice stream of traffic and conversions as you write high-quality guest blogs for high-DA platforms.

Your goal is to find prospects with market relevancy. This technique helps you get hyper-specific and ensure complete relevance.

Recommended Read: Guest Blogging and Blogger Outreach Master Plan

5. Take a Peek at Your Competitors

Your competitors are often your best resource.

Sounds odd, right?

It’s true!

As a small business/startup, you’ll have a set of successful competitors who have been in the game for many years.

Even if you run a business with experience, there will always be certain names that stand out in the industry for what a spectacular job they’re doing.

You want to get on their level.

So what do you do?

You recreate their strategy!

When done ethically, this is a white hat SEO strategy.

Avoid digging into their personal records. Instead, make do with whatever information is publicly available to you.

And trust us, there’s always loads of data to work with!

Use a competitor analysis tool to kick things off. You’ll get an overview of all the sites offering backlinks to your top competitors.

These are the sites you need to target.

6. Don’t Shy Away From the Broken Link Building Strategy

Backlinks aren’t always active by default. In fact, many excellent backlinks fail to work their magic simply because they’re inactive.

If you launched a link building strategy a while back, you might have a handful of broken links waiting to be fixed.

And even if you’ve never dabbled in link building, you’ll still have a few organic backlinks that need resuscitation.

You’ll have to use paid software for this.

At Search Berg, we identify and fix broken links as part of our backlink building services plan.

Once you rescue these links, you’ll start earning link juice again.

Make sure you leverage the broken link-building strategy every month.

As links become inactive over time or new links are mistyped, you’ll be able to stay on top of everything and roll out the fixes ASAP.

This is a great way to keep your backlink profile health on track.

Now Over to You

In this blog, we walked you through the top prospecting guidelines for link builders. We also covered some mistakes to avoid when prospecting links.

You have all the tools you need to identify link building partners and launch a kickass strategy.

Let’s roll out the plan, shall we?

At Search Berg, we offer professional link building services to small businesses and startups across the globe.

It’s time to get your rankings back on track and steer your business in the right direction!

Sign up for our backlink building services today. If you have any questions, our team is always ready to help.